Saturday, January 23, 2010

Laguna Trivia

Because of Laguna Beach's long and illustrious history as an artists' colony, the local high school sports teams were for many years called the "Artists". Eventually, somebody (football players?) rebelled, and after some tussling with the archivists and historians, they had the teams renamed: the "Breakers". We have it from a reliable (primary) source that Laguna Beach High School students have been known to leave school during lunch to go surfing and never return.

Thursday, January 21, 2010

Poster

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Tornadoes in Southern California?!

The Laguna Beach Music Festival is now officially under way, and it has been wonderfully enriching so far! It is very inspiring to be surrounded by so many talented musicians, all collaborating with excellent composers. To top it off, the community is so friendly, involved and enthusiastic. It is difficult not to have a good time!

We were hoping to escape the harsh cold of New York City, and while it has been about twenty degrees warmer here in Laguna Beach, I am afraid the weather has not been terribly friendly. Some of you may have even heard about the tornado warning earlier today in Southern California, which happened to be issued as we were rehearsing. We could see the ocean right behind us as the room in which we were rehearsing faced directly onto the beach and the ocean. The waves were crashing in as it started to dump rain and hail -- it was all very dramatic. It was also very rainy yesterday but right before the performance, everyone got a little break from the gray sky, and as the skies cleared up, I managed to capture this on my phone:

Yes, this is what we see as we rehearse. A rare glimpse, perhaps, in this unusual week (weather-wise), but I am glad to have captured this nonetheless!

Saturday, January 16, 2010

Off to Laguna Beach!

Tomorrow we leave chilly NY behind and head for Laguna Beach, CA where we'll be spending the week as ensemble-in-residence at the Laguna Beach Music Festival. This year's festival explores the interaction of music and film so a number of prominent film composers are featured as well as composers inspired by film and some traditional masterworks that influenced film music.

We'll be giving a number of world premieres including an awesome new piece that Donald Crockett just wrote for our trio called Night Scenes! Other premieres include pieces by Paul Chihara and Sharon Farber as well as works by Roger Bourland, a multimedia mini opera by Paola Prestini and some slightly older trios by Ravel, Shostakovich, Mendelssohn and Beethoven.

In addition to performances on Thursday, Saturday and Sunday, the week will be full of open rehearsals, lectures, and other events and the amazing festival musicians include Maria Bachmann, Claire Chase, Jon Klibonoff and many composers. It's going to be an exciting week so get a plane ticket and come enjoy the sun and music (or send your friends in southern CA...). The full schedule and information are here: http://www.lagunabeachmusicfestival.com/concert.html